In recent years, devices for storing video and related content, such as the personal video recorder (PVR) or digital video recorder (DVR), have transformed the multimedia programming landscape. While “time-shifting” television programs has been popular with users since the advent of video tape recorders, new technologies related to broadcasting, communications, digital recording/playback, and data processing have recently come of age, enabling users to obtain multimedia content from a wide variety of sources and make use of this content using a similarly wide variety of consumer devices.
Among those technologies, PVRs, DVRs, and similar devices (e.g. devices sold under the trademarks “TiVo,” “RePlayTV,” “Sky+,” “Showstopper,” as well devices running PVR applications such as “EyeTV,” “SageTV,” “Meedio,” “Freevo,” etc.) have permitted users to amass large amounts of multimedia content. The abundance of this content (e.g. television programming), is such as to threaten to overwhelm the ability of a typical user to keep track of what is stored. For example, a typical household with two or more users can easily exhaust the storage capacity of a typical DVR, requiring that a content management scheme be implemented in order to determine which content should be deleted or overwritten to make room for new content that users desire to store. In another example, advances in networking technology have enabled, for a single household system, the use of recording and storage devices from any location at any time, leading to confusion as to which household members have accessed particular devices or content.
These problems have traditionally been addressed in DVR systems through the use of automatic content management schemes and user profiles. A typical automatic content management scheme manages content according to a hierarchy established by an administrative user and user characteristics stored in a user profile. For example, the administrator may choose to prevent recording of, or delete on an as-needed basis, those stored programs less favored than other recorded programs, based on content and/or other characteristics, such as length of time since the program was recorded, length of time since the program was last accessed, which user recorded the content, which users have viewed the content, the requesting user's age or household status, etc.
A problem with such an automatic content management scheme is that an administrative user often configures the scheme once during initial setup of the device and subsequently fails to monitor or modify the configuration. This results in user dissatisfaction with the scheme and increasing conflict among household users competing for scarce storage resources (e.g. teenage children). Another problem with such a scheme is that it fails to address a problem inherent in content management activity involving access to a single resource by multiple users: users may require assistance to coordinate their activities, for example via communication, in order to come to an agreement as to which content may be disfavored, forbidden, or otherwise less suitable for storage relative to other content.
For example, some traditional PVR devices include user profiles that permit an administrative user to choose particular television channels, content with particular ratings (e.g. as established by TV Parental Guidelines (TVPG), the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), or other organization), or other features to which each user may or may not be permitted access. In addition to or in conjunction with such user profiles, traditional PVR devices of this type may use “V-Chip” or similar technology to block user access to whole categories of content, some portions of which may be suitable for access by those users. Without more, such blocking may lead to confusion or resistance regarding the content management scheme employed by the PVR. This in turn may lead to user dissatisfaction.
Given that user satisfaction may be negatively affected by the content management schemes previously available, there is a need for a content management system and method that permits users to more easily communicate with other users concerning specific stored content in order to ease the problems that arise from sharing limited storage resources. The desired system and method should provide content management tools that promote sharing by all users, ease the process of establishing a consensus for managing limited resources, encourage monitoring by the administrator, and are compatible with existing systems and devices for a reasonable cost.